Now
they had traversed great deserts and had been six days cut off
from water, when they drew near this meadow and saw therein
waters welling and trees laden with ripe fruits and the land as
it were Paradise; it had donned its adornments and decked
itself.[FN#102] The branches of its trees swayed gently to and
fro, drunken with the new wine of the dew, and therein were
conjoined the fresh sweetness of the fountains of Paradise and
the soft breathings of the zephyr. Mind and eye were confounded
with its beauty, even as says the poet:
Look on the verdant smiling mead, with flowers and herbs beseen,
As 'twere the Spring thereon had spread a mantle all of
green.
If thou behold it with the eye of sense alone, thou'lt see Nought
but as 'twere a lake wherein the water waves, I ween:
But with thy mind's eye look; thou'lt see a glory in the trees
And lo' amidst the boughs above, the waving banners' sheen!
Or as another says:
The river's a cheek that the sun has rosy made; For ringlets it
borrows the cassia's creeping shade.
The water makes anklets of silver about the legs Of the boughs,
and the flowers for crowns o'er all are laid.
When Zoulmekan saw this champaign, with its thick-leaved trees
and its blooming flowers and warbling birds, he turned to his
brother Sherkan and said to him, "O my brother, verily Damascus
hath not in it the like of this place.
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